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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29551452">A Place to Rest</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/its_mike_kapufty/pseuds/its_mike_kapufty'>its_mike_kapufty</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Tumblr Ficlets [34]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Rhett &amp; Link</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Comfort, Cuddling &amp; Snuggling, Emotional Support, M/M, Referenced Pandemic, Stress Relief</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-15 20:29:36</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>537</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29551452</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/its_mike_kapufty/pseuds/its_mike_kapufty</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>When they got to college, it stopped.<br/>When they landed careers, it felt decades ago.<br/>When they moved across the country and showcased their lives, it had never happened at all, and there they agreed.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Rhett McLaughlin/Link Neal</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Tumblr Ficlets [34]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2170695</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>17</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>A Place to Rest</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The sheets used to smell like lavender because that was his mom’s favorite detergent; an extra dollar at the store and seeds budding in one’s head at twilight would bloom into 4am flowers whose boughs carried kind dreams.</p>
<p>He would never admit it aloud, but nothing ever settled him like that familiar bouquet of blossoms and forget-him-nots when they got to sleep over, and so he held those moments close and basked in them with the acknowledgement that they wouldn’t go on forever—that every <em>“wanna come over?”</em> could be the last, honey savored and sucked from the comb before it was simply a husked souvenir on the windowsill.</p>
<p>And though the smells of a bed that could be called “theirs” weren’t anything to sniff at, the thing he knew he would miss most in the long run was due to his own unfortunately broad shoulders. If untended, a person as large as he could lay on his side and feel the weight of his arms crush the wind from his chest, even in serenity. One half of a chest is heavy enough without doubling onto its own heart and lungs. So, that time in 10th grade when Rhett first cautiously discovered he could extend an arm and lay it on sleeping Link’s hip—slowly and reaching, fingers aching towards his best friend’s knees—and if there, he relaxed? The weight left. His chest rose and fell easy, far easier, a feat in itself for the crush of the world on a teenager.</p>
<p>Link awoke sometimes at the feel of skin on skin, of <em>Rhett’s</em> skin on his, yet never moved or complained of the arm on his thigh. Once, he realized and sighed—a long, contented thing—and Rhett fell asleep before he’d started his next breath.</p>
<p>The end of these nights was inevitable. Unless college counts (it doesn’t, Rhett had decided, when they felt like curios stacked on shelves instead of safe in a drawer and near), that last memory was a warm August one. He had known at the time. When he had slipped his hand to Link’s then-hooked hip to begin its voyage, Link had backed into him. Neither spoke a word of the warmth, though Rhett hoped he wasn’t alone in feeling something akin to treasure with his face pressed unflatteringly to the nape of Link’s neck and more awake than he’d ever been.</p>
<p>When they got to college, it stopped.</p>
<p>When they landed careers, it felt decades ago.</p>
<p>When they moved across the country and showcased their lives, it had never happened at all, and there they agreed.</p>
<p>When the weight of the world grew brutal—tenfold, twentyfold, stay inside, <em>stay away</em>—it was during a nap on their couch when Rhett caved and ran his palm along Link’s hip, seeking-near-begging. Needing.</p>
<p>And when Rhett had paused for fear that he alone remembered the ritual that let him breathe against everything, only then did Link’s fingers entwine with his own and guide them down to rest on that same spot of aged skin, with its same muscle, same heat, and same stroke of thumb.</p>
<p>The next day, Link would ask Rhett why he had ordered a lavender candle for their house.</p>
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